


SDCC Hookup - Panels with a side of the Undead

by fresne



Series: SDCC Hookup [6]
Category: Bones (TV), Doctor Who, Merlin (TV), Sherlock (TV), Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M, SDCC, SDCC2013, San Diego Comic-Con
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-07-18
Updated: 2013-07-24
Packaged: 2017-12-20 14:32:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 8,821
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/888365
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fresne/pseuds/fresne
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Merlin had always felt like he was waiting for something. He was fairly certain that what he was waiting for was Comic Con.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Wednesday - Also Line Standing - Merlin

**Author's Note:**

> This series is a set of interconnected stories for various fandom's mainly to hook up various pairings at San Diego Comic Con (SDCC). Each story will follow one pairing within the overall series. There turned out to be a overlapping storyline, but shouldn't need to read all the stories to get the fairly simplistic plot.
> 
> This is possibly the closest thing to a WIP that I've ever posted. And while SDCC is over, and I've finished (three days after the fact) the stories, it's still the rawest, post as I went, story I've ever done with fairly minimal editing. 
> 
> I'll (hopefully) be looping back to deal with that soon. In the meantime, take the rawness as being to a degree how SDCC feels like. A mad rush.
> 
> Largely if a fandom is modern day, generally speaking characters can show up. Largely, becayse I reserved the right to arbitrarily keep a few fandoms to be fandoms characters could talk about/visit panels for.
> 
> And just so you know, in this universe both Wormhole X-Treme and Firefly ran for 10 years. What, it's my universe.
> 
> This is an AU modern setting in which both Merlin and Arthur are reincarnated. Lance Sweets makes a minor appearance in the role of Lance. And quite possibly Lancelot.
> 
> May the hookup begin.

Merlin had always felt like he was waiting for something. 

When he said that, his Mum laughed. The last time he said it, a week before he left, she said, "Sweetheart, you're only nineteen. You have your whole life ahead of you."

He flopped back on his bed. "Mum!" He spread his arms wide and made an angel in the sheets. "I have an old soul." 

His Mum looked around the chaos at her feet and said, "Or a very young one. Look at this mess." 

"I'm trying to decide what to wear to Comic Con." His Mum laughed and left him to it. He knew that she thought that all the energy he'd put in over the last year had been about Will and the accident, but that wasn't it. 

He was going to meet his tribe. He was going to a great gathering of all the tribes. 

It felt like that dream where he had wings and they were covered with dew and he was waiting to jump off the ledge and get started with his life. Sometimes he woke up certain that magic was crawling around crackling inside of him. That if he could just remember the language of dreams, he could bring statues to life or pull lightening down from the sky.

They were just dreams.

Still, he and Will had saved up together. After the accident had happened, he'd waited for the tickets to go on sale alone. He'd whispered to the page to let him in and he got tickets for Thursday, Friday and Sunday. He couldn't afford a hotel, but he had a plan after reading up.

Every day, after work at Uncle Gaius' shop, he poured over all the blogs. He read 100 tips for surviving Comic Con. He followed the official twitter. He followed the unofficial twitter. He waited, come on, come on, come on, while the schedule came out each day. He planned and replanned and replanned the plan for his attack. He was bringing the bare minimum and a sleeping bag. He could store his stuff during the day at the convention center. He could sleep in line at night. It would fine.

Not that he told his Mum that. He told his Mum, he was staying with friends of friends. She smiled softly and said, "Now you be sure to take pictures." He promised to take pictures of everything.

The night before he left, he should have been sleeping. It would be his last night in a bed for days. He opened up his dodgy netbook and promptly got pinged. Seemed Watson was posting to "Things the RAMC Shouldn't Let Johnny Do". He fell asleep reading and woke up every hour or so in the night wondering if it was time yet. Blinked to see that there was another post. It had been Will's favorite online comic. Full of black humor and sarcastic stick figures. There'd been a post after Watson was shot in action. Months of nothing. Then comics as usual. Reading, it felt a bit as if Will was there with him. He read aloud sometimes..

Merlin read to himself. Laughed to himself, because it was always dark and funny and he fell asleep next to the computer.

He woke up and it was time to go. He said goodbye to the internet, because he couldn't take it with him. Not sleeping outside. He had a copy of "Watchman", "Maus", and Watson's "Stick Figures from the Front", which he'd been saving, even if he had read it all before online.

He caught the bus to the train. The train to London. Accidentally left Stick Figures on the Train, but he was in too good a mood to get too upset. Another train to Heathrow. He almost hyperventilated as he went through security. He could almost feel those wings stretching. 

Truth be told it should have been dull waiting for the plane, but there were planes taking off and there was planes landing and it was all a bit magic. They announced first class boarding and he picked up his bag so he'd be ready to wait in lines, because Comic Con, according to all the blogs, was all about waiting in line. He saw this absolute wanker shove by a bloke with a cane. Red liquid tumbled out of the cane bloke's cup. His mouth, always talking ahead of his brain, was already shouting, "Hey, what the hell do you think you're doing." 

The Wanker turned around. He was actually pretty good looking. Blond and blue eyed and only a few years older than Merlin. Still a complete prat though. He tapped his watch, which was silver plated something. "They're calling first class."

"Yeah, I get it, you're first class. Next thing, you'll have me in stocks for talking back to you." Merlin was not going to back down. People couldn't just walk through other people. It wasn't right.

"I don't have time for this." His Royal Pratness pushed by Merlin, which had him almost tumbling back into the plastic seats.

Unfortunately the only zinger Merlin came up with was, "Oi." He turned back to the first bloke, who was awkwardly shoving papers through the spilled juice on the floor with the tip of his cane.

"Oh, hey, let me help you with that." Merlin scooped up the napkins from his packed lunch and threw them on the floor. He grinned, because he couldn't help the happiness that was bubbling up, "Do believe that prat? Some people think that just because they have more money, they can..." which was when he looked up and recognized the face of the bloke looking down at him. The face that he'd been looking at on the back cover of his book. "Oh My GOD! Are you John Watson? The John Watson."

Merlin shook his hand, because that was a thing to do. "I am your Biggest fan. I was up half the night reading "Things the RAMC Shouldn't Let Johnny Do". Every time my feed pinged. You were on fire." He wished then he'd lost Watchmen instead of Stick Figures. "God, if only I had my copy of "Stick Figures from the Front". Are you going to be doing more collections of your work? Wow, I can't believe I'm running into you like this. Literally. Although, I suppose that that prat literally ran into you, but I mean." He looked down at the crumpled pages on the floor. "Oh, my God were you wiping up the floor with your work?" He grabbed at the pages, while realizing he was still holding Watson's hand and wished for a moment that he could sink into the floor. 

Watson awkwardly bent down and it was all Merlin could do not to swoop down for him. "Do you want them? They're a little wet." He picked them up and held them out. Merlin thought he was going to die. He was too young for a heart attack, but he was going to have one and he was having one right now and it was going to be fine because John Watson was handing him original artwork. "I... I... really. Oh, my God this is going to be the best convention ever. I haven't even left London and I've met someone amazing. Could you um, sign this, to um, Merlin. If that wouldn't." He could hear them call boarding. "Oh, they're boarding us. Um, wait, shouldn't you have been with the first class call?"

Watson smiled at him and it was the kindest, most rumpled smile imaginable. "No. I'm in steerage with the rest of the cattle." He was funny in person too. A bit too old for Merlin, but his type. He felt his heart beating a fast rat a tap tap in his chest.

Watson wrote something in the upper left. Merlin looked at the page. "To Merlin, my fellow steer in deepest juice. John Watson."

Merlin clutched the pages to his t-shirt. They were wet and sticky and he did not care. 

He didn't care all the way to San Diego. He laughed as he went to a shop downtown and bought a tube of wrapping paper. He rolled the drawings up inside it. He grinned hard enough to hurt as he headed out on a local train out to Mission Valley to pick up his badges for each day. The signs at the train station had been replaced with Klingon. The side of the train was wrapped with an add for a video game. All the building were covered in giant posters for science fiction and fantasy movies. He hugged his knees to keep from exploding. He grinned at the girl giving him his badges. He smiled and nodded and was so very happy all the way back. He got a sandwich and then followed the line that already curved behind the convention center until he found the end.

He sat down and said to the two women ahead of him. "Hey, I'm Merlin. This is my first Comic Con. I'm here for the gathering of the tribes."

They smiled. One said, "I'm Penny, and this my friend Rita. We're here for the Wormhole X-Treme Fifteen Year Retrospective." 

Rita waved her sandwich. "They're going to have panels for all three shows. WX1, WX: Shangrila, WX: Dimensions. Dude, it's like. Dude. The entire cast for all three shows are going to be at each panel. It's going to be awesome."

"Cool." Merlin hadn't watched much WX: Dimensions, but he'd seen the odd rerun of WX1. He looked back. There was already a hundred people behind him. He grinned at the man standing in a brown trench coat holding a stack of books. "Hey, I'm Merlin."

"I am Castiel." He nodded at Merlin gravely. Merlin knew what it was like to have a name like, well, Merlin, so he grinned, while Rita and Penny giggled. 

Rita said, "What are you here for?"

"I am waiting for Dean Winchester." Castiel held up the stack of books. They were from that Supernatural series, which was when it clicked with Merlin. "Oh, I get it. You're cosplaying Castiel."

"Dude," said Penny, "You do realize that Supernatural isn't until Sunday morning. They clear out the convention center every night. This isn't going to guarantee you a good spot on Sunday."

"I am waiting," said Castiel.

"I hear that," said a dark haired man behind Castiel. "I think the lines are kind of Zen though. You know, prayer through walking. Accepting what is." He pointed at himself. "I'm Lance. Seems like we're going to be waiting for a while."

Merlin grinned at Lance, who grinned back. Castiel looked at both of them and in a strangely fluid move sat down cross legged on the cement. He tilted his head and Merlin could practically see little white mice running on wheels in his head. "You are waiting also."

Lance held out his arms. "We're all waiting. Actually," he lowered his voice, "I'm a psychologist. Most of the time I'm profiling for the FBI. This is a great change."

Lance didn't seem all that much older than Merlin, who was too happy to be worried that he was about to be studied. Because Comic Con. Merlin checked his watch. Only sixteen more hours. He settled in to eat his sandwich.


	2. Thursday - Uberman and Batmankof

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Merlin attends some panels and has a wee bit of a breakdown during an academic panel.

Merlin slept surprisingly well for having slept outside. 

Admittedly, he was very damp. He was almost cold. He desperately wanted a shower. His back hurt. Cement was hard it turned out. But all his things were still at his feet in the sleeping bag and he'd slept the whole night. Which was kind of surprising given that Castiel was still cross legged next to him looking like hadn't moved since Merlin dozed off around midnight.

"Did you sleep at all?" Merlin cracked his spine in an attempt to make things right in there. He wondered if he looked like giant worm with black hair.

Castiel said, "I did not sleep."

Merlin crawled out of his bag and pulled out his rucksack. "Too excited. I get that way sometimes." He looked around at his new group of friends. "Anyone want coffee? I'm heading to the Starbuck's line."

"All praise the bitch goddess coffee," said Rita. 

Penny, propped on one elbow and already was starting to deal her Cards Against Humanity cards, said, "That means oh, hell, yes." 

Castiel sat very straight backed and said, "I do not need coffee." 

"Dude, you are not human." Penny fished some crumpled bills out of her wallet. "This should cover us."

Lance came with Merlin. He told a story about wanting to be a knight when he'd been a little boy while they stood in line, before he'd gotten into heavy metal. He was really nice, but he was a zero ping on Merlin's gaydar. Too bad, because he was cute. Although, Merlin still had trouble believing that he was old enough to be a Profiler for the FBI. 

Lance watched the coffee when Merlin realized that perhaps peeing should happen before coffee. He washed up as well as he could in the handicap stall.

Afterwards, Merlin cracked his back again and looked at himself in the mirror of the bathroom. He said, "This is going to be the best con ever." A very tired looking Asian bloke wearing a "Robots do it with precision" shirt said, "I hope. I flew in from Singapore."

Merlin bounced on his feet. "Cardiff." 

He'd have skipped back to his place in line, but coffee really didn't take well to skipping.

He floated on that Comic-Con excited buzz until five minutes after they got back in line his Royal Pratness from the plane flight walked up and sat next to Lance in line. Words scrambled to get out Merlin's mouth. "You haven't been waiting with us. What makes you think you join the line like that?"

"Um, Merlin," said Lance, "This is my friend Arthur. I said, he'd be meeting me."

His Royal Prat of Wankerdom had the gall to glare at Merlin. "What is your problem?"

"My problem is I slept out in line and you didn't. Now you think you can just join the line." Merlin's heart was beating against his chest and he felt light headed.

Rita was rolling up her sleeping bag. "Merlin, chill. We've totally got some friends meeting up with us." She looked at her watch. "And they had better get here soon. They generally pre-load the building at 6:30." 

"Or they can do their own damned line standing." Rita bumped fists with Penny.

When Penny and Rita said it, it sounded reasonable, but there was just something - everything - about Arthur that rubbed Merlin the wrong way.

He must have still looked mental, because Penny said, "It's fine, Merlin. He's behind you. Drink your coffee. You'll feel better."

Rita raised her cup. "All hail caffeine. Uncrankify us all."

Merlin made himself sit down and ignore the the prat behind him. But the day had soured in his stomach. 

He told himself he was going to enjoy himself. He read some Watchmen and ignored Arthur looking over his shoulder and muttering, "Of course, _you_ would be reading Watchmen."

Merlin ignored him while the line finally jerked into motion ahead of them and they tumbled into the convention center. It was freezing inside. Merlin could hear the AC gusting cold wind into the building. He checked in this sleeping bag at the luggage check station and got a ticket. He clutched his map of the convention center while people flowed around him. He went up the escalator and gawked at the people below him. He went to his first panel, "Comics Arts Conference Session #1: Comics and the Violent Past" and the Prat was there. Sitting in the back row of an empty room. Merlin sat next to him and crossed his arms daring him to say something. The Prat shifted in his seat. He did not disappoint. "You can't possibly be here to listen to someone talk about Daytripper."

"Because in your universe only someone like you could possibly interested in the Academic track." Merlin's arms remained crossed. They remained crossed and he was cross.

"In most universes, I would think." His Pratness sneered at him and tried to look down his nose at Merlin.

Merlin was taller. "That's your problem." He thought about it another moment. "Shorty."

"What are you twelve?" His Pratness stood up and tried to get loomy on Merlin. "I am not short."

Merlin shrugged and stood up. "Shorter than I am." He sat down again. A woman was talking from the podium about how the goal of the Comic-Arts convention is to bring together artists with fans to learn about the medium. 

Arthur elbowed him. "Shh... I want to hear this."

Merlin elbowed him back. They exchanged glares. Merlin tried to listen to the first speaker talk about how young artists in Lebanon were trying handle a reality that it was not a question of if the next war would occur, but when. The art she displayed in her presentation was surreal and beautiful and struck some resonant chord in Merlin, which made no sense. He'd never been in so much as a fight. But there he was tugging back and forth the speaker's graphic novels with his Pratness and exchanging volleys of violent quiet with him. 

His Pratness hardly waited the for the panel to be over before he bolted out the door. Merlin rolled his eyes and reminded himself that this con was about meeting his people. He was meeting all of his people. Even the Prats, who he would probably never see again. There were over 120 thousand attendees. He was not running into the Prat again.

Except there he was in the last row of Merlin's next panel, "This is the Really Real World - Autobiographical Perspectives in Comic Art". Merlin sat next to him. Again. They glared at each other and said more violent nothing.

Merlin tried to focus on the panel, which was great. He'd never heard of Holmes, but his brushwork was simply gorgeous. Holmes and Watson were having a love affair on panel, and Merlin wanted to be full of squee and yell at them to kiss already, there was warm mass of Prattity Prat next to him. 

Who had the gall to stand up and give a heartwarming story about Watson saving his best friends life and giving him a gift. Merlin waited for the room to boo a fan giving a gift, but they didn't. The room made a sort of collective "Awww." noise and it was sick making. He waited for the psychic girl to figure out that the Prat was a prat. He waited for Holmes to deduce that the Prat was a prat. He wanted to wave the juice stained drawing in the air and yell, "I have the proof that this man is a Wanker and Prat!"

He didn't. This played out in his imagination and he missed ten minutes of the panel, which was His Royal High Pratnesses fault. Who didn't even notice Merlin's death glare when he walked briskly out of the panel. 

When Merlin went to the room for "A Conversation with Steven T. Seagle and Teddy Kristiansen", he wondered what fresh hell he had tumbled into because there the Prat was again. Sitting in the back row. Again. So Merlin sat next to him. Again. 

The Prat said, "Why are you following me?"

"I'm not following you. These are the panels I wanted to go to. A lot of the blogs suggested trying for smaller panels rather than the big name panels. That way you can just walk in and enjoy your con."

"And you slept in line for that." The Prat had this you are a moron look on his face."

"I slept in line because I can't afford a hotel room." He crossed and uncrossed his arms. "Not all of us are Lord Wankers of Pratonia."

"Oh." The Prat looked away.

"And I can't believe you actually gave Watson a bottle of scotch." Merlin kicked the chair in front of him.

Arthur crossed his arms. "He saved my best friend's life."

"Yeah, and you knocked him over in the airport in your rush to get into your first class seat." Merlin tried to think of something else to say, "which is one of many reasons you hold the ministerial position of Prat.

"I..." His Pratnesses brow wrinkled. "I didn't notice him."

"Yeah, you don't notice a lot of things." Merlin poked the Prat in the chest. "And what is with the rushing out of the panels."

"I, I just." He swatted away Merlin's hand and tapped his watch. "I don't like being late. It's. It's wrong to make other people wait. I like to be on time."

"I'd say it's worse to knock people over in you rush to get someplace on time, but what do I know?" He shrugged. "I'm not a first class prat. Now shut up. They're starting."

Arthur shoved his shoulder. "You shut up."

Merlin shoved him back. "No, you shut up."

The girl next to them said, "Could for the love of Lord Vader both of you shut up! Thaaaanks."

They went back to violent silence at each other.

They walked left walking adjacent to each other. Because, of course, they were both going to the "Changing Representations in Comic Media" panel. They sat next to each other in the last row. Arms crossed. Looking straight ahead. Violent, vicious, blood dripping silence between them.

The first speaker presented on focused Batmankof's emotional constipation with his created family. The second panel was on the various the variously horrible things that Uberman had done to his best friend Timmy and his poor girl friend Mona Mane with examples pulled from the "UbermanIsADick.com. The time Timmy dressed as a woman to infiltrate the mob and when a mob boss got frisky, Timmy substituted a chimp, was the speaker's favorite example of dickery. The speaker summed up with, "So, as you can see, Uberman is a dick."

The first speaker said, "While Batmankof is more of an asshole."

"Yeah, you're right. Uberman is a dick. Batmankof is an asshole. Uberman is a dick. Batmankof is an asshole."

Merlin couldn't help it. His inner twelve year old grabbed him by the spine and vomited laughter out his face. The Prat was laughing quietly next to him. "Did he really just say that."

The speaker was still repeating it. Merlin whimpered. "He's still saying it."

They looked around the room. No one else was laughing. Merlin was laughing so hard, he was crying. He stumbled out of the room and propped himself up outside the door crying. Arthur stumbled after him. "Were we the only ones whose minds went to the dirty place."

Arthur rubbed his chest. "I solemnly promise to never grow up."

Merlin held up his own hand. "I swear oh Little Lord Wanker of Prattenshire to never grow up." 

"I thought I was Lord of Wankonia? And for the last time, I'm not little." He grabbed Merlin around the neck and briskly rubbed his hair. 

"Quit it." Merlin flailed and laughed. "That's why you have more than title, shorty."

"Ha." Arthur's arms around him were very warm and he was very fit and Merlin couldn't stop laughing. "Droit de Seigneur. I am not short. "

Merlin coughed, because if that meant what he thought he did, he was going to die laughing, and at the same time he was really close. He stopped laughing, his breath caught in his throat. He forced out. "No, you're Highness. You're a giant among Prats."

"Great." Arthur seemed to feel it too. He let him go. They stood there nodding at each. "You'll make a great fool." He framed his hands around Merlin's head. "I can imagine the hat."

"Ha." Merlin flipped him the bowfinger, and tried to fight down his blush.

"So, um, you know we've been going to the same panels all day. We should make it a set." Arthur rubbed his neck. "I'm meeting Lance for dinner. You should come join us." 

Which was where Merlin's gaydar was flipping back and forth and he really couldn't tell if that was a ping or wish fulfillment. "I probably can't afford to eat where a my liege would eat." Merlin sketched some sort of bow.

Arthur rolled his eyes. "Yeah, well, at least I'm not Uberman." They both paused and awkwarded at each other. Arthur looked away from Merlin, made a show of looking at his watch. "Come on. If we leave now, we'll be early." They headed down to luggage check where Merlin reclaimed his sleeping bag, while Arthur tapped his foot and adding color commentary.

They cut through the park by the "Ender's Game" display out away from the Gas Lamp district into a quieter set of side streets until they ended up at a small pizza place decorated in a sort of bright medieval theme. 

Arthur opened the door for Merlin. "First night is always pizza night. Then we can have cold pizza for breakfast the rest of the con."

Merlin found himself grinning back. 

They ordered pints and were in the middle of playing Marry, Shag, Cliff, when Lance arrived.

He had on his back an absolutely enormous bag of boxes. Lance put it down with a proud thunk. "I went to the Dealer's Room and I came away with just about everything I was wanted to buy. He pulled out an Uberman head from the latest movie, which unfortunately had Arthur and Merlin choking back a laugh. Lance continued on oblivious. "The only one I wasn't able to get was one of the limited edition Darth Maul figures that Gelder & Co put out." He laughed. "My heart wasn't pure enough, I guess." Which then led to a discussion of the dark side of the force, which led to a discussion of what an Arthurian quest for balance in the force would look like. It didn't take uber geeks to realize that they were Arthur, Merlin, and Lance sitting at a pizza place with metal shields on the walls. 

Merlin clinked his pint glass against Lance's. "To your good fortune in the fields." He handed his napkin to Lance. "Here you can take my favor into the lists." Under the table, Arthur kicked him. "Owe, what was that for?"

Arthur shrugged. "Droit de Seigneur. I have the right to abuse you."

Lance looked at them intently. "You two would make an interesting psychological study." He put some bills on the table. "But I've got to go. See you next year."

"What. Isn't he?" Merlin looked as Lance struggled to pick up his enormous Comic Con bag. "You're only here for today?"

Lance laughed. "Yeah. I got everything I came for. I only come for the first day." He shrugged. 

Arthur rolled his eyes. "Lance is a 'collector'. Someday he'll stay for the rest of the con." 

Lance fought his way out the front door and it was just them, which should have been awkward, but how could their conversation get awkward when they got into talking about the panels for tomorrow.

Merlin's phone chirped. It was late. "I should be going." His back just hurt thinking about it. 

"That's stupid. You're staying with me." Arthur glared at him. "There's plenty of room at my hotel room."

"No, I...." Merlin trailed off. "I shouldn't." He really shouldn't. This was a really bad idea, what with Arthur increasing on the attractive range by the hour. Merlin privately blamed Uberman/Batmankof.

Arthur picked up Merlin's sleeping bag. "This isn't a discussion. I'm the Lord of both Prattenshire and Wankonia, and you are my," he looked Merlin up and down, "fool." 

Merlin was too busy panicking to do more than say follow after Arthur to the Hilton next to the convention center.

Arthur wasn't staying in a room. He was staying at the penthouse. His bathroom was larger than Merlin's room at home. The tub was an enormous somethingagon shape with jets. Mouth running merrily along before his brain, Merlin said, "I think I may be in love with this tub. At the very least I want to have sex with it." Arthur made a noise. He was looking at Merlin. Merlin blushed with the sudden image of having sex with Arthur in that tub. 

He cleared his throat. "Maybe not. Dating a tub in San Diego could be difficult. Long distance romance and all that. I expect it wouldn't be faithful either."

Arthur snorted. "It would definitely cheat on you. Now out of my way Fool, I need to um... brush my teeth."

"Oh, that's. Yeah. Thanks for letting me stay here."

Arthur flapped a hand at him. "I have take care of my Fool. Droit de Seigneur and all that." He stuck his toothbrush in his mouth. 

Merlin didn't say that Droit de Seigneur meant that Arthur had the right to have sex with Merlin. If Merlin were getting married, which he wasn't. He didn't say anything because he put his hand over his mouth and bit the palm of his hand to remind himself not to say anything to a complete stranger that he'd spent most of the day hating that would regret in about three days. "I uh... I guess I'll sleep on the sofa." 

"Don't be any more stupid," Arthur said around the toothbrush. The white foam on his chin should not have been cute. Merlin was not going to find drool attractive, "Bed's enormous." Arthur was not looking at him. He was watching himself in the mirror. 

Merlin nodded. "Yeah." He let out his breath. He reminded himself that he hadn't showered in two days. He reminded himself that he was fairly disgusting. He went to the door to get his toothbrush from his rucksack. He brushed his teeth. He took a very cold brisk shower and did not look at the tub. He undressed down to his shorts and gingerly climbed into the enormous bed in the enormous bedroom with Arthur already a lump on the other side. 

He was certain that he'd lay awake a long time, aware of Arthur on the other side of the bed, but unconsciousness had other ideas the moment his head touched the pillow and he closed his eyes and dreamed. He dreamed of magic and dragons and a white castle in the middle of the green woods.


	3. Friday - Braving Ballroom 20

Merlin was with Arthur in his rooms in Camelot. 

In this place, they were not King and Manservant.

Outside the wide open window, there was a wild summer rain that constrained them indoors. Merlin had summoned it to so constrain them. Water slid down the white walls of Camelot. It trickled over ridiculous carvings of castles on castles and ancient kings on towers and crocodile rain spouts. All the world outside was wet and slick upon the city of Camelot in the green wood.

In that world outside, Arthur was King in his armor and King at his Round table. Where for all that it was round, still Arthur was the king and Merlin stood behind him to serve him his meal. 

While here, in Arthur's rooms, in Arthur's bed, they lay not master and servant, but lovers for these six months since King Uther's death, and Merlin gave first waited vigil, and then comfort and then love, and as ever all his loyalty. That in the world outside, they stood as separate was at Merlin's insistence. Arthur would be the greatest king Albion had ever known. He would one day see that magic was not evil. He would see and when he saw, Merlin would tell him everything.

Until then, Merlin gave everything. He lay in that wide soft bed with its tick of goose feathers and beneath them the ropes of the bed frame groaned as they moved against each other. 

Arthur teased Merlin with his lips. He bestowed soft kisses. He teased Merlin with his hands rough with the calluses of holding a sword. Fingers skimmed along Merlin's back leaving trails of fiery want. Arthur said, "Tell me a secret." Hands slid lower, cupping the Merlin's nether cheeks. "I want to know you."

Instead of answering, always instead of answering, swallowing words and letting out gasps, Merlin parted his thighs slick with sweat and took Arthur between their grasp. They slid against each other in that wide white bed with its carving and curtains that could hold back the world. Merlin's phallus against the firm line of Arthur's belly, while Arthur slid back and forth between Merlin's thighs. Arthur cried out please and Merlin could not tell if he begged for secrets or for Merlin to go faster. He choose to interpret for speed in groaning bed with its linen damp with the sweat of their bodies.

Merlin gave to his King, to the other side of his coin, everything of himself, except for that one single thing. He spent himself against Arthur even as Arthur spent himself surrounded by Merlin, while outside the rain that Merlin had summoned fell.

 

Merlin woke with a gasp in a very different bed and in a very different place. For a moment, even though he was lying down, he felt vertigo from that sudden snap of centuries. In his dream, it hadn't felt like a dream. The results of that dream, sticky on his thighs and belly were certainly real enough.

Wide blue eyes met startled blue eyes. Merlin said, "I... uh." Arthur rolled away from him. He sat on the edge of the bed, facing away from Merlin. His feet on the ground. His shoulders hunched.

Merlin had an overwhelming impulse to put his hand on the shoulder of this stranger, whom he had met yesterday. It was overwhelming and he was tumbled to it. 

Arthur looked up startled at Merlin's hand and said, "Who are you? We met two days ago. Why?" He shook his head. "I apologize that was, I did not intend to while you, I, we were sleeping."

Merlin opened his mouth to say something, but he didn't have any words. He fled first to the bathroom for the quickest roughest shower that he could. Yanked on his clothes and ran from the hotel room, remembering only to grab his day pack and his badge. He ignored Arthur calling after him.

He ran around the giant balloon figures of the Teen Titans Go. He ran and he came across Castiel, walking gravely in the compressing line to go into the Convention Center. Castiel said, "Is this the line that you are looking for?"

Merlin didn't know where he was going or what he was doing or what had just happened. He'd never done anything like that. He had been friends with Will and then lovers and then Will was gone, and he wasn't like this. He said, "Yes."

Castiel introduced Merlin to the other people around them in line in that always playing the character of Castiel way of his. The line compressed first into a complicated series of ropes and nets under the tents. Then it shot into the Convention Center, which was freezing, and Merlin realized he'd left his hoodie and most of his belongings back in the hotel room. But he wasn't going back for them. It was good to be cold. 

He lost himself by following Castiel into the Ballroom 20 line. He hadn't planned on going to Ballroom 20 with its all day commitments and lack of small room intimacy. He wanted to avoid intimacy. He sat in line for hours as if they were minutes. Castiel didn't say much of anything. Neither did Merlin. The line moved. They walked back and forth under tents and trees in planters. Someone pointed out a Destroyer sailing up the harbor from or to the Naval base and just fitting under the bridge to Coronado island. A woman dressed as a Fem Hawkeye played complicated clapping games with a girl dressed as Merida. Merida's dress made Merlin think of his dream.

Castiel said, "I was not in your dreams."

Merlin blushed. "No, uh, what?"

"I did not enter your dreams." Castiel repeated. 

It should have been creepy, but he said it so simply and honestly that Merlin laughed, "Good thing. That would have been even more awkward."

The line twisted back into the cold Convention Center pumping refrigerated air into the building. It was already warming up as people flooded inside. 

Merlin went into Ballroom 20. Merlin sat in a chair next to Castiel and watched panels all day. He was hiding. He hid through "Big Bang Theory", and the cast was funny and he laughed. He hid through "Legend of Korra." He tried to lose himself in watching the episode that they premiered. He tried not to think. He hid through the premiere of "Intelligence". He hid through big panels in which the crowd went insane cheering at the people on stage, yelling, "I love you." 

At three of the panels, a little boy dressed as a character that Merlin didn't recognize stood first in the question line and said, "This was my wish from the Make a Wish Foundation, to come to Comic Con." The first time he came up, the crowd cheered after he said that. The second panel, the crowd yelled as soon as his small white and blue face appeared on the monitors.. By the third time, the crowd chanted his name as if he were on stage. It was sweet and sad at the same time, and made Merlin feel a little silly for his panic attack in the morning.

Castiel said, "It was not given to me to heal him. I have never asked this question before, but in studying the Gospels I do wonder, why is there illness and suffering in the world?"

"I don't know." Merlin rubbed his face. "I guess that's why we make stories where we can fight it." He turned to Castiel and said, "Thanks for letting me sit with you, but I've got to go."

He went to the panel that he would have gone to at that time if he hadn't been hiding. Arthur was sitting in the back of the room. Arthur stood up when Merlin came through the door. He said, "I'd didn't know what to do except go the panels that I'd planned to go to and hope to find you."

Merlin shrugged. "Hey."

They stepped out into the hallway and wandered looking for a quiet spot. There weren't really any. Finally Arthur said, "I didn't mean for that happen." Just as Merlin was saying, "I'm sorry."

Arthur laughed. "This is ridiculous. We just met. And I don't really believe in sudden Con hookups. It's an unreal environment where our emotions are high and I sound like a complete prat don't I?"

"I wouldn't worry about it." Merlin glanced up from the floor. "You always do." They laughed at each other and shook hands as if it were a vow to just be friends.

They meandered out of the Convention Center. Somehow they ended up eating dinner at someplace ridiculously posh, which Arthur paid for, and it felt a bit like a date, except it wasn't even remotely like that.

They walked through the Gas Lamp, talking about nothing, until they ended up in Arthur's room at the hotel. After all, half of Merlin's stuff was there. Arthur held his right hand over his heart. "I solemnly swear nothing will happen." He threw a line of pillows onto the bed. "I swear." 

Merlin blushed, because he kind of hoped something would happen. But it would be a bad idea. He and Arthur lived different lives. They had nothing in common. It took Merlin a long time on the far side of the pillow wall to fall asleep.


	4. Saturday - Of what Dreams may Come

His dreams were a shattered mirror of fragments. He and Arthur were a gold coin melted down over and over again to be reminted with different patterns, but always the same.

He dreamed Arthur the Good Knight and the Marshal to Bad King John. The proud way Marshal Arthur grinned at Merlin as he signed his name to the Magna Carta, and the night Merlin crept off to call the wild magic that drowned King John's treasure so he couldn't hire an army to crush the little wedge in new freedom.

He dreamed the Civil War with himself hunted by Roundheads and Cavaliers alike for what he was, and Arthur taking him in, unknowning. They saved the world from something dark that lived beneath the moors and no one knowing it, at the cost of Arthur's life. Arthur never knowing what Merlin was.

He dreamed WWII with Arthur climbing into his fighter plane and Merlin, his mechanic, who kept the engine with his name flying with tools and whispered magic. He dreamed furtive meetings in empty storage rooms and the last time Arthur took off never to return to Merlin's arms.

He dreamed a hundred lives. He dreamed a hundred deaths. They fought monsters from the stars that sought to devour the world, or slithered from the depths. They battled humans, who merely sought to chain down some portion of the world to their will. They fought and they loved and always, the secret of who Merlin was trembled on his lips, but he never spoke it until too late. 

He woke up with tears running down his cheeks. He stumbled into the bathroom. When he came out, Arthur was sitting up with his blond hair at all angles and his face soft from sleep. Arthur smiled at him and the echo of the dream made Merlin's heart ache. He swallowed. "Shouldn't we be getting downstairs?"

Arthur waved him off. "There aren't actually any lines for the panels we're going to." He bounced up and lines of his body seemed so familiar to Merlin, and yet he was a stranger. "We're going to two of the hidden gems of Comic Con. Quick Draw and Cartoon Voices."

"We are?" Merlin swallowed a smile at the tone of Arthur's voice. "Hidden gems."

"Yeah, gems. For Quick Draw, they get three artists draw all sorts of things the audience suggests." He put his hands on his hips. "It's hilarious."

"Okay." Merlin had to look away from Arthur. He busied himself getting dressed. 

"And for Cartoon Voices, they get these voice actors, who you've never heard of, but you've heard in cartoons and ads. They put on the worst radio play you can imagine."

"And that's good." Merlin rubbed his head.

Arthur threw a pillow at him. "It's hilarious."

Arthur was right. Not that he'd say that.

He might not have had to. Merlin sat next to Arthur, and laughed and laughed some more, all the while acutely aware of Arthur sitting warm next to him.

They stayed for a media panel on a show Merlin had never heard of, but Arthur watched. He kept leaning over and whispering in Merlin's ear and poking him and Merlin had to bite his lip to keep from saying anything. They had just met. They were not friends. They lived different lives. Merlin was still grieving for Will. It was just the convention that was making Arthur seem so familiar.

Later, they walked the Dealer's Room, which was a distraction beyond distractions. Full of people and costumes and booths and free buttons and posters and comics and books and it was a sensory overload. When they couldn't take it any more, they pushed their way out of the crowds and had a late lunch at the cafe that Scyfy had taken over and turned it into the cafe from Defiance. Well, without the prostitutes. The food was overpriced, but science fiction themed.

Merlin wasn't really hungry. He ordered soup, and was an economic vegetarian. 

Arthur ate and waved his hands and grinned at Merlin in such a familiar way. "They've set up a Camelot run over by Petco park. You go through an obstacle course and monsters from the show jump out at you. I did it last year, but it'd be better with another person to watch my back. And you look fit." Arthur froze, flushed and looked away. "You're doing it with me. I couldn't possibly go without my Fool."

Merlin sincerely doubted spending his time running around in the dark with people jumping out at him would be fun. "Yeah. Okay."

They stood in a line to get in and it cost money, but Arthur insisted that since it was his idea, he'd pay, which made Merlin feel seven kinds of a loser, but he couldn't afford to go in and that was all there was for it. Not if he was going to eat.

They ran through a series of cement blocks and people dressed as undead not-zombie things chased them. Merlin's heart pounded.

AMC had done an amazing job dressing the course up. It really looked like a dark forest. They ran up a set of stairs and past a sort of wading pool with mist on it. A siren sang threateningly at them. Merlin's fingers twitched to hold her off. 

They went up into what looked like a Dark Tower, up and up until they came to the next level. It was almost pitch black. They walked around the corner. A Basilisk raised its head was about to blast them with something green and drippy. All Merlin could think was he had to keep Arthur safe and all he could think was he wanted to know Arthur and for Arthur to know him and he yelled a word that he didn't know. He yelled it and held out his hand and called down a flash of golden light, which illuminated that the Basilisk was made from plaster and the goo was the lime jello. The golden light though, that was magic.

Arthur looked at him wide eyed and Merlin remembered. A hundred lives and he remembered. It should have been horrible remembering that much all at once, but it felt as natural as a flower opening.

He looked at Arthur and he saw the memory in his eyes as well. Arthur said, "You utter idiot." The love of a hundred lives punched him in the shoulder. Unnecessarily hard. "I'm an idiot. How did I never notice that you're such an idiot? How did you keep this a secret?" Arthur grabbed Merlin and kissed him. 

A voice over a loud speaker came on, "No loitering in the Camelot experience. Please move along."

Arthur let go, took Merlin's hand in a very firm grasp and dragged him out the door.

Merlin rubbed his shoulder. "I guess I have a lot of explaining to do."

Arthur rolled his eyes. "I remember being born and reborn for the first time in over a thousand years, no. You'll be begging me for forgiveness, if I have to tie you to the bedframe and pound you into the mattress to do it."

"If you do that, I won't be begging for mercy." He gave Arthur a cheeky wink.

Arthur chuffed his shoulder. "Then I will have to do it more than once."

In that they were collectively hundreds of years old with the stamina of an eighteen and twenty-two year old, Merlin didn't beg until the third time sometime around early morning. His hands writhed against the soft cotton of t-shirt tying him to the bed frame. More loops for him to tug against than anything else. They'd uncoil if he opened his hands, or whispered magic words. He gripped tight and cried out as Arthur moved slowly inside of him. More of a slow rocking motion that brushed against his sensitized everything as Merlin curled his legs around Arthur.

The room smelled like olive oil, because in their haste to get back to the hotel room, they'd forgotten to buy lube, and that was all they could order from room service. The room smelled like sex and them and all the love of all the lifetimes and Merlin whispered, "I'm sorry. I should have told you."

"Shhh..." Arthur whispered back, rocking them farther and farther, sensitive and exhausted into a tumble in the middle of the bed.

Merlin lay wrapped in Arthur's arms. He snuggled backwards, a little too tall to play the small spoon, but not wanting to move from where he was. "If we've been reborn, then something bad is on its way."

"I know." Arthur squeezed him. "But tonight is for us." He laughed, the sound shaking his chest. Vibrating into Merlin. "Best Comic Con, ever."

Merlin fell asleep to that thought.

If he dreamed, he didn't remember.


	5. Sunday - Yawning in the Face of the Coming Storm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the battle is joined, and Donna orders coffee.

Merlin woke up face down in a pillow, his head pounding.

Actually, no. That was the door. "Ngh."

Arthur shoved him. "Answer door."

Merlin intelligently responded, "Ngh." 

The knocking on the door continued. Merlin shoved himself up on his elbow. "Why do I have to do it?"

Arthur nestled further into his side of the bed. "S'good to be king."

"Ha, ha, ha." Merlin climbed over Arthur, and decided to take the sheet with him. It would serve Arthur right. 

Merlin opened the door. There was a prissy looking bloke in a grey suit and a sunburned woman in tourist casual. "Can I help you?"

Prissy bloke pushed past Merlin. While sunburned woman stared at him. "I thought you'd be," she gestured at her chin. "Older."

"Who are you?" Merlin struggled to keep his sheet up, while realizing that a) prissy was in the room, and b) Arthur was starkers.

"Mycroft Holmes and Donna Noble," said Prissy, plucking a white robe from inside of the closet and how had he even known that was there? "I'm a minor official in the Brotherhood of Pendragon."

Donna snorted. "Himself is a minor official in all the secret societies that secretly run the world, and really, Merlin, really? I seriously thought he'd be older."

Arthur pulled on the robe, flashing the room before he belted himself in. Merlin struggled with the sheet.

Donna tilted her head in a way that Merlin, and clearly Mycroft did not care for. She looked at Mycroft. "What? I'm not blind and that's the Once and Future King flashing me the crown jewels." She tossed her hair back. "Here." She handed Arthur what appeared to be a small replica of a sword.

Arthur looked from the sword in his hand to Donna. "What am I to do with this?"

She waved at it like she was on telly. "It's Excalibur."

"It is under a spell, Your Majesty." Mycroft smiled in an incredibly deferential, but not really way.

It was at that point that Merlin heard the sword's song. It was the song of lakes and sleeping and dragon's fire. He whispered to it and it didn't so much grow as be what it always was, a full sized sword.

Arthur nearly dropped it as it transformed. "A little warning, oh." He smiled at it and swung it right, then left. "I'd forgotten how it felt to hold it."

Donna muttered something about boys and their fake pricks, which all the men in the room decided to ignore. 

Arthur said, "If you are bringing this to us, there must be a reason."

Mycroft placed a briefcase on the table. "The Brotherhood has been waiting all these ages for your return." 

Arthur and Merlin glanced at one another, and Merlin decided not to mention this wasn't their first round on the Carousel, since this was clearly a big deal with this Brotherhood.

Mycroft clicked open the briefcase's locks. "All of the signs point to a rising darkness."

"Why is it always a rising darkness." Arthur curled his fingers around the hilt of Excalibur. "Have the other knights been reborn?"

"No, but we believe that fate is already at work gathering a new band for the table round." Mycroft pulled a stack of manila folders out of the briefcase. "We've gathered dossiers." Which was great and wonderful and thrilling and Merlin ruined it by yawning large enough for his head to collapse backwards, which set Arthur off.

Donna slapped Mycroft on the shoulder. "I told you we should wait a few more hours." She pushed him towards the door. "I told Secret Overlord here, that you'd need a few more hours of sleep after meeting again after a thousand years." She closed the door behind her, calling out, "I'll send up housekeeping in a few hours with some coffee and breakfast. Chop. Chop. Wake up so we can save the world," and closed the door with a click.

Arthur and Merlin looked at each other for a long moment, before collapsing onto the bed in laughter. 

Whatever storm was coming, they'd face it, together.

**Author's Note:**

> It occurs to me I should wrap this up with some sort of end note.
> 
> Since I somehow ended up with a Dark is Rising sort of plot, despite that when planning these fic I resolved no Dark is Rising overarching plot. Apparantly, when I write quickly, I ignore myself.
> 
> Anyway, this isn't a WIP. This is the end. Unless I can think of a plot that requires: Rodney McKay, John Sheppard, Sherlock Holmes, John Watson, Merlin, Arthur Pendragon, John Reese, Harold Finch, Charlie Bradbury, Diana Prince, Donna Noble, Mycoft Holmes, Dean and Sam Winchester, Castiel, and other assorted minor characters that showed up.
> 
> Well, okay. The Goa'uld think they are looking for artifacts left behind by Echidna, who they assume was a Goa'uld. The Super Secret EVIL Cthuloid cult know that they are trying to free Echidna and Typhon, and their offspring from beneath Mount Etna.
> 
> The characters above break off into smaller and more writeable sets to go figure the plot and find magical maguffins, all the while the writer curses having already hooking up the characters at SDCC, because it would be more dramatic to slowly do over the course of the story.
> 
> They figure it out, deal with the Goa'uld and the cultists. The Machine seriously wants to know why all ancient texts haven't been scanned and there aren't more cameras in ancient temples. Bwhaha, Echidna and her offspring are free. Fight. Fight. Fight, which I hate writing anyway, and triumph of a new age, in which the general populace learns about magic and the Stargate program.
> 
> Cue Merlin and Arthur moving to the actually quite small castle in the North of France, which was renovated in the 1800s to look more castley, which is why Camelot in Merlin looked so pretty.
> 
> Mycroft runs the world. Donna tells him not to be daft.
> 
> John Watson changes his blog to "Things Johnny really Ought to Do, or Mad Adventures" and starts writing about how amazing he thinks Sherlock is and stops talking about the war. There is adventure.
> 
> John Reese is thoroughly pawned by Harold Finch and the Machine, and they set up house in a really nice virtual data center in Space. Why in Space, because then Finch could be Batman, building a space station as a line item in his R and D budget. This is why teleportation would be critical. They do eventually touch during sex. They don't stop playing trust games. The Machine orders them a great many things online, which really couldn't be called sweet.
> 
> Rodney McKay and John Sheppard win the next year's Masquerade at SDCC. McKay develops a Pavlovian response when Sheppard drawls his name, which results in many advances in science and a lot of PWP.
> 
> Charlie Bradbury and Diana Prince travel the countryside fighting evil in a pretty sweet looking vintage VW Bus, which Diana occasionally carries when it breaks down.
> 
> Sam and Dean/Castiel likewise. Only in the Metallicar.
> 
> There. The end.


End file.
